_{[mark matousek} biography^]

 

Mark Matousek was born in Los Angeles on February 5, 1957.  He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1979 (summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa), received a fellowship to Worcester College, Oxford, the following year and an M.A. in English Literature from the UCLA in 1981.

        After graduation, Mark moved to New York, where he worked as a stringer for Reuters, International, then in Newsweek Magazine's letter department, before being hired as a proofreader at Andy Warhol's Interview Magazine.  He became the magazine's first staff writer, then senior editor the following year, conducting hundreds of interviews with figures well known in film, television, books, fine art, politics, design and science.  In 1985, he quit his job and spent most of following decade as an itinerant dharma bum and freelance journalist, traveling between Europe, India, and the United States.  Shifting professional gears from pop culture to psychology, philosophy and religion, Mark became a contributing editor to Common Boundary Magazine, where his back page column, The Naked Eye, appeared from 1994-1999.  He received a National Magazine Award nomination for "America's Darkest Secret" (about the epidemic of incest in the U.S.) and published essays in numerous magazines,  including The New Yorker, Details, Yoga Journal, McCalls, The Utne Reader, AARP Magazine, Out, and Harper's Bazaar.    

         After working with Sogyal Rimpoche on The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, Mark collaborated with religious writer Andrew Harvey on Dialogues With A Modern Mystic (interviewing Harvey for Britain's Channel One documentary of the same name).  His first book, Sex Death Enlightenment: A True Story (1996) became an international bestseller published in ten countries and nominated for two Books for a Better Life Awards.  Having served as co-editor on Ram Dass's book, Still Here, Mark published his second memoir in 2000, The Boy He Left Behind: A Man's Search for His Lost Father (Los Angeles Times Discovery Book, Randy Shilts Award, excerpted in the Sunday supplement of the London Guardian).  A contributing editor to O: The Oprah Magazine and Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, he has taught creative non-fiction writing at Manhattanville College and published essays in numerous anthologies, including Wrestling With the Angel, Voices of the Millenium, A Memory, A Monologue, a Rant and a Prayer, Oprah's Best Life.            

           His most recent book is When You're Falling, Dive: Lessons in the Art of Living (2008).   Mark collaborated with playwright Eve Ensler that same year to create VMen (the male arm of VDay, Ensler's organization for ending violence against women and girls) and curates their online essay series (www.vday.com).  In addition, he has partnered with journalist Jimmie Briggs to create "Ten Ways To Love a Woman," a public service campaign that will culminate with a book-length anthology and performance piece to be presented at the 2010 World Cup in Johannesburg, South Africa.

         Mark is currently at work on a new book called What Makes Us Good?, to be published in late 2009.